What We Do Work Pass/D/Fail Option

Students for Graduate Curriculum Options

The Students for Graduate Curriculum Options (SGCO) is a task force under the GSC Academic, Research, and Careers (ARC) Committee charged with examining whether and how to implement an option for MIT graduate students to take subjects beyond their core requirements on Pass/D/Fail (P/D/F), similar to that available to MIT undergraduate juniors and seniors.

Spring 2009 is the first term in which students may exercise the Graduate Pass/D/Fail option.

The amendment to the Rules and Regulations of the MIT Faculty to implement Graduate Pass/D/Fail can be found here. The articles in the Tech and Graduate Student News describing the rationales behind our Pass/D/Fail proposal can be found here (Tech article), here (GSN - DOC) and here (GSN - PDF). Answers to frequently asked questions (FAQs) can be found here.

We are active during the 2006-2007 and 2007-2008 academic years. Since the Graduate Pass/D/Fail Option was approved by the faculty in March 2008, the administration has been working on implementing it as quickly as possible so that students may begin exercising the option in Fall 2008.

This initiative grew out of a discussion from the EECS Education Committee (VI-Ed) in Spring 2006. VI-Ed explained its support for a graduate Pass/D/Fail option in a letter circulated to the MIT community (letter available). Over the summer, Emily Fox and Stephen Hou, the two graduate students on VI-Ed, assembled SGCO, which consists of graduate students from different departments and programs at MIT.

Timeline

  • Spring 2009 - First term Graduate Pass/D/Fail comes into effect
  • Wed Mar 19, 2008 - Approved by the faculty
  • Wed Feb 20, 2008 - Presented to the faculty
  • Thu Feb 07, 2008 - Obtained unanimous Faculty Policy Committee (FPC) endorsement
  • Wed Sep 26, 2007 - Obtained unanimous CGP (Committee on Graduate Programs) endorsement
  • Spring/Summer 2007 - Obtained feedback from departments around MIT
  • Wed Mar 07, 2007 - Obtained unanimous GSC endorsement
  • Wed Feb 28, 2007 - Met with Committee on Graduate Programs (CGP)

SGCO Members

NameDepartment/ProgramE-Mail
Emily Fox* Elec. Eng. & Comp. Sci. ebfox
Pranava Goundan Operations Research pranava
Stephen Hou* Elec. Eng. & Comp. Sci. shou
Sharon Karackattu Biology PhD; Bio. Eng. Post-Doc sliz
Cheston Tan Brain & Cognitive Sciences cheston

*Co-Chairs

Documents

  • Apr 2006 - Original letter from EECS Education Committee [PDF]
  • Aug 2006 - Letter soliciting applications to SGCO [TXT]
  • Oct 2007 - Draft of Proposed Graduate Pass/D/Fail Policy [TXT]
  • Oct 2007 - Draft of Proposed Amendment to the Rules and Regulations of the MIT Faculty to Implement Graduate Pass/D/Fail [PDF]
  • Feb 2008 - Proposed Amendment to the Rules and Regulations of the MIT Faculty to Implement Graduate Pass/D/Fail [PDF]
  • Feb 2008 - Article in Graduate Student News describing the rationales behind Pass/D/Fail [DOC][PDF]
  • Mar 2008 - Article in the Tech describing the rationales behind Pass/D/Fail [HTML]

Meetings

The SGCO meets every two or three weeks. We welcome all interested students, faculty, and administrators to attend. The meeting minutes and schedule for future meetings are below.

Wed Sep 20, 2006 10am - 11am 38-466 [PDF]
Thu Oct 05, 2006 5pm - 6pm 38-466 [PDF]
Thu Oct 19, 2006 1pm - 2pm 50-220 [TXT]
Thu Nov 09, 2006 1pm - 2pm 50-220 [TXT]
Mon Nov 27, 2006 9:30am - 10:30am 32-D451 [TXT]
Thu Dec 07, 2006 5pm - 6pm 50-220 [TXT]
Fri Dec 08, 2006 11am - 12pm 32-D451 [TXT]
Wed Jan 31, 2007 12:30pm - 1:30pm 50-220 [TXT]
Thu Feb 22, 2007 5:30pm - 6:30pm 50-220 [TXT]
Wed Feb 28, 2007 3:15pm - 4:15pm 10-300 [TXT]
Thu Mar 15, 2007 12pm - 1pm 50-220 [TXT]
Thu Apr 05, 2007 12pm - 1pm 38-477 [TXT]
Tue Apr 24, 2007 7pm - 8pm 5-220 [TXT]
Wed May 23, 2007 1pm - 2pm 50-220 [TXT]
Tue Sep 18, 2007 12pm - 1pm 50-220 [TXT]
Wed Sep 26, 2007 3pm - 4pm 10-300 [TXT]
Fri Oct 12, 2007 10am - 11am 50-220 [TXT]
Thu Oct 18, 2007 3pm - 4pm 3-132 [TXT]
TBD TBD TBD [TXT]